Kitty leaves the Jean Grey School and goes to Cyclops with the OG X-Men all in toe. No reasoning given beyond some hysterical meltdown, even Bobby jabs her with a "because shitting up all time and space makes sense?" parting shot, and Scott smirks like an asshole as they teleport away.
Essentially Bendis won the tug of war with a character and gets to keep them to further All New X-Men and shit up Aaron's plans and actually good run even further. Random Future X-Men left around for more bullshit next year. X-books left in more of a mess than ever before after Schism actually tidied them up. Dat decompression.
Oh and it is never explained why the originals can't go back at all. GREAT EVENT.
Speaking of, WHOA DAMN that Francavilla spread opening this issue of GotG. This whole issue was fucking great, but WHOA DAMN it took me a while to drink it all in and it was so good.
(But y'all are way too harsh on BotA, which was as big and crazy and stupid as it needed to be. Aaron didn't wait until Bendis to underwhelm on WatXM, and, seeing as this is not DC, they were probably in cahoots when dealing with the fallout of the event)
It's not that much of a problem. It gives the writers more controll over "their" characters and the shared characters are reduced.
Bendis moved the cast of ANXM over to Cyke's point of view. I was quite pleased with it, despite the cross over lasting like 5 issues to long
On other news: Infinity and Avengers continues to rock and Hickman's Thor and Cap get further bonus points for being awesome.
And in regards to the GL Annual 2:
The whole last few month were spent to built up to this point and give the writers the chance to do some house cleaning. A clean and neat break with the last run, a few bad gaps in storytelling but a nice way to give Guy/Kyle/Hal nice roles to play in the month to come . Now we get a GL universe that can develop a bit more freely. The "death" of the entities with only Paralax remaining is a nice touch, that brings a bit more of the "pre War of Light" danger back to him and makes him unique again. Nice idea. That they refrained from Kyle/Hal/Carol drama was nice as well.
Nightwing Annual 1: When does this take place? I thought that it may be before the first Chicago arc but this does not seem right?
The Babs/Richard Drama pulled a few strings and I hope that next year after FE we will see a bit of romance with our Bats. Both characters would have much to gain from it and Babs seems only likeable in the N52 when she is around Dick, so...
After the preview we see a fight between Kyle and Relic. The entities power Kyle and as Relic realizes this he tries to "experiment" on them and pull them out of Kyle. A last minute rescue of the Reds, Greens and Carol gives them a chance to regroup. Meanwhile John rallies the rest of the GLC and the Indigo and teleports to the source wall as well. Running on their last fumes Hal realizes that everything the source wall touches get's absorbed by it. While the rest of the lanterns fight the drones the four earthlings regroup for one last stand against Relic. The idea is to crush him into the source wall. But Kyle insists that Relic is right and only his methods flawed. In the fight Guy, John and Hal give the rest of their ring charges to send relic on his way. But at the end it is Relic and Kyle that are left flying towards the wall. Kyle realizes that if he fights for the living his powers up increase and is able to recharge to 100% just at the moment he and Relic hit the source wall. Moments later Relic is spit out again and fused to the source wall, telling the surviving lanterns that Kyle recharged the emotional spectrum. Afterwards he becomes one with the soruce wall, contempt to have saved a universe (at least this is how I read his peaceful faceexpression and tear). The lanterns mourn Kyle, Hal get's melodramatic and want's to send Carol away as noone has enough energy left to get the group back towards a planet with an athosphere. John gets angry with him and tells him that their ride home has already been booked as he had a deal with the Indigo tribe. The guardians stay behind to mourn Kyle while the Indigos send all of the others home. Guy with the Reds. Hal and the GLC to Mogo. Carol and Saint Walker are not to be seen. At Mogo the power battery is reforged by the guy who rebuild the indigo one earlier on. Hal tries to rally the GLC and inspire them, but half of the corps - especially the veterans - are not willing to use the energy anymore, because they know that the rings are destroying the universe. In the last few pages we see Kyle return form the source and he tells the templer guardians that the entities are dead. Together they embark on a journey to discover some kind of secret as the issue ends with the trite "An end and a beginning" message.
So every lantern had a great showing and most of the important plotpoints are adressed. Now the lanters have a new kind of "limit" on their powers and I look forward to see how this will play out.
Care to explain? To me the X-books as a group are far stronger now than they have been in years, even when BotA was too drawn out. And esepcially Uncanny was very good before BotA in my eyes with fresh characters and good drama.
You guys convinced me not to get Kubert's Damian book.
It was the preview where
he thinks he sees Tim Drake's dead body but he says, "Tim" I may be wrong but doesn't he always call him "Drake"?
Same with Alfred, he calls him Pennyworth, which is what made issue #700 so cool because it's he calls his cat in the 666 universe, Alfred! How touching.
Crazy still is Kubert DREW that story. Come on dude, calling "lesser" people by their last names is his thing! I hate not getting a book based on previews and such but they are making it so hard.
I have not read it but I know people seem to like Tomasi's New 52 B&R run, but I have a hard time trusting anyone other than Morrison with the character.
To join in the discussion about artists as writers, I have to agree with people in the case of Manapul and Buccellato on The Flash. I really want to love this book. The art and storyline have been pretty cool but the dialog, my goodness!
I hate to say it but it reminds me of Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones. Specifically, something Red Letter Media points out in their review of that, when they are writing the dialog between two people in love, they write it as some grand romantic idea. No two people dating would talk to each other the way Patty and Barry do. It reads as extremely unnatural. It reminds me of how they used to rapidly talk in old movies like, It Happened One Night or Bringing Up Baby. So bad. At least they are moving on to Detective Comics where the only thing Batman loves is kicking the shit out of people.
I look forward to the next creative team on Flash.
I'm so weak, I bought Damian. Unfortunely my coworker asked off today a few weeks ago and I had to fill in for him today. Can't read my stuff until tonight.
After the preview we see a fight between Kyle and Relic. The entities power Kyle and as relic realizes this he tries to "experiment" on them and pull them out of Kyle. A last minute rescue of the Reds, Greens and Carol gives them a chance to regroup. Meanwhile John rallies the rest of the GLC and the Indigo and teleports to the source wall as well. Running on their last fumes Hal realizes that everything the source wall touches get's absorbed. While the rest of the lanterns fight the drones the four lanterns of earth regroup for one last run on Relic. The idea is to crush him into the source wall. But Kyle insists that Relic is right and only his methods flawed. In the fight Guy, John and Hal give the rest of their charges to send relic on his way. But at the end it is Relic and Kyle, who is charging his powers up and is able to recharge to 100% just at the moment he and Relic hit the source wall. Moments later relic is spit out again and fused to the source wall, telling the surviving lanterns that Kyle recharged the emotional spectrum. Afterwards he becomes one with the soruce wall, contempt to have save a universe (at least this is how I read his peaceful faceexpression and tear). The lanterns mourn Kyle, Hal get's melodramatic and want's to send Carol away as oneone has enough energy left to get the group back. John gets angry with him and tells him that their ride home has already been booked as he had a deal with the Indigo tribe. The guadrinas stay behind to mourn Kyle while the Indigos send all of the others home. Guy with the reds. Hal and the GLC to Mogo. Carol and Saint Walker are not to be seen. At Mogo the power battery is reforged by the guy who rebuild the indigo one earlier on. Hal tries to rally the GLC and inspire them, but half of the corps - especially the veterans - are not willing to use the energy anymore, because they know that the are destroying the universe with their ring slinging. The last few pages we see Kyle return form the source and he tells the templer guardians that the entities are dead. Together they embark on a journey to discover some kind of secret as the Issue ends with the trite "An end and a beginning" message.
So every lantern had a great showing and most of the important plotpoints are adressed. Now the lanters have a new kind of "limit" on their powers and I look forward to see how this will play out.
I'd like to think Amazing and WatXM are going to see me through, but if Bendis keeps being given free reign to fuck with the entire X-Universe at a whim and Aaron is forever going to have to react to those terrible twists, that just aint no way to treat one of your best writers by chaining him to the back of one of your worst.
Its also funny because whatever Remender is doing with X-Characters in Uncanny Avengers seems almost on the level of a MAX run and completely irrelevant.
The X-Books are 90s 2.0 right now. The blue/gold divided team across multiple titles, the ugly ass costumes, the dumb crossovers lacking in even basic character motivations, bad artwork, everything. The intelligent comic book crafting happen around the early 2000s with Morrison/Milligan/Carey and even Whedon/Cassaday did a decent riff on Claremont 80s X-men, now its just bland cookie cutter Brian Wood, decompressed stories with shit characterzations that go fuckin' nowhere with Bendis, and WAAAACKY Jason Aaron stories with these terrible Hellfire brats nobody fuckin' liked for 30+ issues and are so cartoony the stories never had any dramatic stakes. Gillen is gone, Remender is gone, my interest is gone. X-Men Legacy is getting canned soon, too.
Read GL Annual on my break. Pretty cool conclusion that makes you excited about the future. As someone who just pulls GL, it made me care for the other books and characters in the Lantern universe. I'm not gonna add them all but I'll be paying attention.
Edit - kinda fun to think about but you have Forever Evil happening and little do these people on Earth know what's going on in the Universe.
"I wanna be a dinosaur! Rhino-saurus? Nice!!"
Bebop and Rocksteady. Oh my.
One Turtle-verse to rule them all. It truly is the best of all continuities. This comic has made me retroactively not enjoy the Nick show at all because it is not THIS animated but never ending filler sagas.
In retrospect, Necrosha (as an X-Force arc, didn't care for the tie-ins) and Second Coming are way better than BotA, in the sense that there are things happening, they make sense due to character motivations, they happen at a nice pace and they have conclusions that come from everything built up to that point.
Let's not pretend BotA had that degree of structural competence.
Nightwing Annual makes it glaringly obvious that Dick and Babs are 100's of times better teaming up than they are alone. I'd read the shit out of a Nightwing and Batgirl team up book. They're better than the sum of their parts. I think it's always been that way.
Superior Spider-Man was a funny troll. Otto is so fucked, everything is coming down around him and it's coming down FAST. He's really made a mess of Peter's life.
BotA, nothing happened. Either way it looks like
Bendis doesn't get to write Wolverine anymore, I sort of like his Kitty
so that's ok.
Infinity was just a wrap up and set up for the finale.
Avengers was the same, just a set up for next issue.
Regarding the "shocking" end to BotA: I wouldn't have much of a problem with
Kitty leaving to join Cyclops if her reason for doing so was to look after the O5. That's the whole reason she stepped down as headmistress. If at the end of BotA the O5 team cut out on the Jean Grey School to take up with Cyclops, and Kitty followed them because she made a promise to look after them and in this case that meant reluctantly switching sides, then I could understand that ending and even appreciate it. Kitty being forced into a bad situation and turning her back on her father-figure and her best friends to protect someone else is a motivation I can stand behind. But that doesn't remotely sound like what happened: it sounds like Kitty just blew up on the other teachers for... what, exactly? Not trusting her how? I'm still not quite sure on that, but in any case the O5 says "hey we're leaving too, we can carpool" while Cyclops smirks his damn head off and rubs everyone's noses in it.
Which brings up another point. If there's some great comeuppance in the works for Scott Summers, then I can't wait to see it. But A) I'm not so sure there is going to BE comeuppance, and B) I'm not paying $4 a month to watch him piss over everything waiting until that day comes.
I should mention that I've enjoyed BotA, but only for the time-travel craziness of future Brotherhood and future X-Team shenanigans. The O5's part in all this I cared very little for, which lead to my decision to drop their corner of the world from my list. And it sucks that X-23 is joining them for whatever Bendis is planning to do with her, instead of reuniting with Jubilee and Logan. I'd love to see her in Wood's X-Men, babysitting Shogo.
"I wanna be a dinosaur! Rhino-saurus? Nice!!"
Bebop and Rocksteady. Oh my.
One Turtle-verse to rule them all. It truly is the best of all continuities. This comic has made me retroactively not enjoy the Nick show at all because it is not THIS animated but never ending filler sagas.
I want to cut my pull list down to 30 or so titles from 40.
I'm thinking about dropping Morning Glories ( might pick up the OHCs since i don't like reading this month to month), Justice League and JLoA after Forever Evil ends, Fatale, All New X-Men, X-Men, Uncanny X-Men, and Guardians of the Galaxy since it's crossing over with All New.
Could you explain to me why super girls outfit desperately needs pants, but the cruel artists wont give her the pants she needs to make her outfit top teir.
My comic guy forgot to put it in the pull box for me. Is it worth the $3.99? I take it....not? Honestly, I still like X-books, though. Definitely looking forward to Monet popping up in X-Men.
Also, where's my X-Factor omnibus, Marvel? You motherfuckers.
I want to cut my pull list down to 30 or so titles from 40.
I'm thinking about dropping Morning Glories ( might pick up the OHCs since i don't like reading this month to month), Justice League and JLoA after Forever Evil ends, Fatale, All New X-Men, X-Men, Uncanny X-Men, and Guardians of the Galaxy since it's crossing over with All New.
I'm keeping my pull list at 15 tops (which includes limited series/event books). Though it used to be 30 or so but as months go by, I just wasn't enjoying some of the stuff I was reading. Even if you drop the ones you listed, they'll still be able to buy up either online or you trade wait if you want to go back to it.
On another note, my LCS never received Wolverine and the X-Men #37 (Battle of the Atom Part 9) last week or this week...so I'm sitting here with Part 10 staring at me.
Regarding the "shocking" end to BotA: I wouldn't have much of a problem with
Kitty leaving to join Cyclops if her reason for doing so was to look after the O5. That's the whole reason she stepped down as headmistress. If at the end of BotA the O5 team cut out on the Jean Grey School to take up with Cyclops, and Kitty followed them because she made a promise to look after them and in this case that meant reluctantly switching sides, then I could understand that ending and even appreciate it. Kitty being forced into a bad situation and turning her back on her father-figure and her best friends to protect someone else is a motivation I can stand behind. But that doesn't remotely sound like what happened: it sounds like Kitty just blew up on the other teachers for... what, exactly? Not trusting her how? I'm still not quite sure on that, but in any case the O5 says "hey we're leaving too, we can carpool" while Cyclops smirks his damn head off and rubs everyone's noses in it.
Which brings up another point. If there's some great comeuppance in the works for Scott Summers, then I can't wait to see it. But A) I'm not so sure there is going to BE comeuppance, and B) I'm not paying $4 a month to watch him piss over everything waiting until that day comes.
I should mention that I've enjoyed BotA, but only for the time-travel craziness of future Brotherhood and future X-Team shenanigans. The O5's part in all this I cared very little for, which lead to my decision to drop their corner of the world from my list. And it sucks that X-23 is joining them for whatever Bendis is planning to do with her, instead of reuniting with Jubilee and Logan. I'd love to see her in Wood's X-Men, babysitting Shogo.
I'd like to think Amazing and WatXM are going to see me through, but if Bendis keeps being given free reign to fuck with the entire X-Universe at a whim and Aaron is forever going to have to react to those terrible twists, that just aint no way to treat one of your best writers by chaining him to the back of one of your worst.
Its also funny because whatever Remender is doing with X-Characters in Uncanny Avengers seems almost on the level of a MAX run and completely irrelevant.
Its also funny because whatever Remender is doing with X-Characters in Uncanny Avengers seems almost on the level of a MAX run and completely irrelevant.
If you mean the PAD run, it's getting the Complete Collection treatment starting in December. It's over 100 issues, an omnibus would be ridiculous. I say that as a fan of omnibii.
X-FACTOR BY PETER DAVID: THE COMPLETE COLLECTION VOL. 1 TPB
Written by PETER DAVID
Penciled by PABLO RAIMONDI, RYAN SOOK, DENNIS CALERO, ARIEL OLIVETTI & RENATO ARLEM
Cover by RYAN SOOK
Relive the gripping, noir-esque launch of Peter David’s most memorable concept: X-Factor Investigations! Jamie Madrox sets up shop in the heart of Mutant Town — but with so many duplicates out in the world, who is the real Madrox? Does he even know anymore? Then, when the fallout from the HOUSE OF M depowers most of the world’s mutants, X-Factor must find answers — fast! With Guido, Wolfsbane, Siryn, M and Rictor by his side — as well as the stuff-knowing Layla Miller — Madrox must take on the manipulative prescient Mr. Tryp’s rival group Singularity Investigations, navigate a superhuman Civil War, learn why the X-Men lied to his team, deal with the unbalanced Quicksilver’s new ability to reboot mutant powers for a price and discover the deadly traitor in X-Factor’s midst! Collecting MADROX #1-5 and X-FACTOR (2006) #1-12.
400 PGS./Rated T+ …$34.99
ISBN: 978-0-7851-5438-9
